D.C. Toro 2000 Blind Horizontal

This was a blind vertical tasting of seven D.O. Toros from the 2000 vintage. Other than me, all the five tasters were all in the wine business in various capacities. We all knew what wines were brought but didn’t know which was which. I list the wines and our rankings below so that those who want no further information can have the bottom line right away:1.San Roman 2.Termanthia3.Elias Mora crianza4.Numanthia5.El Albar6.Gago*Gran Elias Mora(corked/unranked)The conditions were ideal. The wine was at a good temperature and decanted about 45 minutes in advance. We each had 7 good quality glasses plus a water glass. We also worked fairly slow and painstakingly, resulting in tasting over several hours. One of the delightful things about the evening was that we made up the rules as we went along, settling on a modified process of elimination whereby we continually narrowed the field of focus. Of course none of the wines were identified until the end. One wine was corked, which we later learned was the Gran Elias Mora - a shame. Of the remaining field, two wines stood out as clearly superior to the others, and these later turned out to be the Termanthia and the San Roman. Gago, despite an 88 or 89 point Parker rating, was eliminated as the most inferior. The El Albar was the cut next - an easy choice. We thought the remaining two wines were roughly of the same class and quite good. One perhaps had started with a bit too much animal on the nose, the other had a bit of a harsh finish - a small burst of acid followed immediately by hard tannins. By the time we were at this point, however the animal scent had blown off the first and we chose it as the slightly superior wine. Our choice was Elias Mora crianza, eliminating the Numanthia. At this stage, however, it remained clear that the Elias Mora crianza was not going to challenge the first two wines that we had initially graduated as obvious finalists. The head-to-head scrutiny and evaluation of those two wines began in earnest. We frankly assumed that one was the Termanthia (and this was later confirmed), but we were far less sure about the identity of the other. The identity of Termanthia was based on the distinctive characteristics mentioned in Parker’s review, which several of us were generally familiar with - very deep and somewhat singular espresso/mocha notes. The other wine, however, had a far broader range of bouquet and flavor (a mocha base, with nice mix of both red and black fruits and toffee in the middle, and spice box hovering on top). We viewed this as an excellent and ultimately superior wine, a view supported by the fact that it kept on improving, with the nose in particular soaring ever higher, whereas the Termanthia seemed to sag very slightly off its peak after a couple of hours. You now know the wine-of-the-night to be the San Roman. Having settled that, we brought on some duck confit. Both the San Roman and Elias Mora crianza paired beautifully with the duck. The Termanthia did not -- a great wine to pair only with itself (which generally is just fine by me). The cost of the San Roman is $35 - a good value in absolute terms and, if compared to the Termanthia at $150-US, a steal. Our third place finisher, Elias Mora crianza, at about $25-30, is also a very good QPR - almost half the price of the fouth place Numanthia, which is apx. $45-50. One disappointment, of course, was the corked special cuvee from Dos Victorias - the Gran Elias Mora - particularly since the basic crianza fared so well.Final comments on the Termanthia: an amazing if somewhat singular wine. I have a couple of bottles of this left and will let it sit for a few years, and then approach much as I would a port.